Despite it looking like spring is finally kicking in, and it being a beautiful day in NYC, Mrs Spesh and myself are off to even warmer climates again tonight for a long weekend. A few tracks I’ve prepared for my holiday playlist. All of which will I envisage will go rather well with rum and cigars, and a nice sea breeze cooling my inevitable sunburn.

Mucho love today to BBE Records. Not only are they one of my favourite labels, but they now hold even higher stock in my musical portfolio, as they are sending me a bag of goodies because I won a competition on Strongroom Alive this afternoon.

I first fell in to the scene after I began to frequent Keb Darge’s Legendary Deep Funk nights at Madame Jo-Jo’s on a Friday night in the late 90s/early 2000s (I’m really not sure when, it is all a bit of a blur). It was the backdrop to some of the best nights I do or don’t remember spending, depending upon my tipple of choice on that given evening. Cats doing head spins with skateboard helmets on, James Brown slides in two tone brogues, and my mate Druid showing them all how it wasn’t done. One dance floor for the normal folk, one for the breakers. It was immense.

I left Londinium for foreign waters in 2004, and haven’t been back to Jo-Jo’s since, so I can’t speak for the validity of the scene nowadays, but I see Keb still spins there, with Andy Smith too to boot, so it can’t be that bad.

The following tracks are taken from BBE compilations I was rocking through the speaker in my C registration Volvo around that time. I couldn’t say which I miss more, those nights, or that car.

Having just waved off a frequent house guest hailing from Luton (she had to leave, she was too gangster for Brooklyn), I’ll kick off with my favourite track from the towns next best export. Swiftly followed by the perfect Velvet song to get back in to bed with on a lazy day. And finally finish off with a bit of funky gospel that gets me back out of bed and over to the fridge, reaching for a cold one to help me get over those North London Derby blues. COYS.

The boy is back from a well-earned break in the French Caribbean. To quote Ferris, “it is so choice, if you have the means, I highly recommend” going.

Considering I was probably happier than I’ve ever been (the rum and cigars were free), my holiday playlist was beautifully morbid in places.

A few tracks that stuck out in the sunshine…..I think I drove Mrs Spesh to death singing Johnny Too Bad…..the harmonica lick on Signed D.C slays me every time it kicked over the phones……despite the recent sample theft, the flute loop on Bobby Bland reminded me I was a million miles from the Jay-Z(though P Diddy was moored just up the harbour so I heard)…..and I can remember singing my heart out to the Wichita Linesman in an ice cold shower to soothe the sun burn.

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Belated Valentines post. If I’m honest, having seen thison Sunday, I almost lost that loving feeling. I did still, however, find it in my heart to arrange for a Madagascan Hissing Cockroach, currently residing at the Bronx Zoo, to be named after Mrs Speshinald, just in time for the 14th of Feb.

Deep down inside I know that back in the day Macca and his band could pen a ballad that melted the heart as oppose to turning the stomach. Namely….

If ever you find yourself brought before the International Criminal Court and have a bit of time to kill in Den Haag, I recommend a little riki-tiki at Vavoom. The cocktails are immense, and to boot they play the kind of music that makes you want to step outside the tavern and sort the wheat from the chaff.

The Farm’s Stepping Stone, Primal Scream’s Slip Inside This House (never understood a word Gillespie was on about mind, always thought he was singing “slip inside the house, like Hugh Hefner”), and Ride’s How Does It Feel To Feel?.

As a spotty adolescent riding the 403 to and from school through the London Borough of Croydinium, rocking these tracks on homemade C90 mixtapes with my Sony Walkman, I thought I was listening to a music my elders couldn’t ever understand.